


Orphan's Christmas

by howardently



Series: Orphans. [1]
Category: My Mad Fat Diary
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-17
Updated: 2015-06-17
Packaged: 2018-04-04 19:07:12
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,969
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4149444
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/howardently/pseuds/howardently
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>AU. Finn's away at University and finds himself without the money to go home for Christmas. And, he's somehow promised his Dad that he'll go the the University sponsored Christmas eve party, which he expects will be a frankly awful evening.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Orphan's Christmas

It’s a fucked up name, Finn thinks as he trudges across the room, scuffing the remains of last night’s sludge across the crummy dated carpet. Just because someone can’t afford to go home for Christmas, it doesn’t mean they’ve got dead parents. And if they did have dead parents, then it’s even more fucked up. It’s a stupid name for a stupid thing, but he promised his Dad that he wouldn’t hide out all alone in his room over the holidays, so here he is in the University’s overly warm cafeteria building with a flask in his pocket and his headphones around his neck. He may be here, but that doesn’t mean he has to enjoy it.

He pushes through the glass paneled double doors into the meeting room and has to repress a groan. There’s no real way to dim the lighting for the party, so the florescent lights glaringly illuminate the depressing scene. In the center of the room, a pair of foldable tables are festooned with plastic holiday tablecloths, but they’re the cheap kind and they show the battered and stained faux-wood beneath. Only a dozen or so chairs surround them, and Finn shudders at the thought of the intimacy they’ll be forced to share. He’s going to have to make meaningless chit-chat with these people for several hours, and he’s exhausted already just thinking about it.

There’s another set of tables in one corner, and a pair of girls are bent over them, fussing with something beneath. He lets his eyes roam over their figures, linger on their upturned behinds for a moment since they’re facing away, but neither of them is anything special from here, and his attention wanders almost instantly. It’s been a near constant stream of girls since he got back four months ago, but none of them have kept his attention for more than a week or so. He’s not sure what exactly he’s looking for, isn’t all that sure he’s looking for anything really, but whatever that elusive thing is, it’s not in the stream of bubbleheaded girls who touch his arm and bat their eyelashes at him over their cheap beers in red plastic cups.  
There’s a small tree in the corner of the room opposite the girls, and it’s pretty enough with a couple of strands of blinking lights and an over-abundance of silver tinsel. It reminds him a bit of his tree at home, his Dad has always had a heavy hand with the tinsel. Finn wonders if his Dad even put up the tree this year, then wonders whether it’s worse if Gary put it up without him or whether he didn’t put up one at all. Since he was ten, he and his Dad and his Nan have always made a night of it. Nan’d make a hot pot, they’d turn on Bing Crosby and drink mulled cider while they decorated the tree, and Finn had always gone to bed feeling a bit spinny but happy. It kills him to think about Gary home by himself for Christmas, and he wishes for what must be the thousandth time that he could have scraped together the money to go home.

When he’d returned to school this fall, he’d made an important promise to himself- he was going to do whatever it took to get his radio career going. He’d just broken up with another girlfriend, and had learned the hard way about being disingenuous, about how shitty it felt pursuing something that he wasn’t especially interested in because it seemed like the thing to do. It turned out that whatever it took was a time-consuming unpaid internship at the local radio station, a late night slot for the campus radio, and an extremely part time job at the record store down the street from his flat. Which ultimately meant that he was dead broke all the time, barely able to scrape together money for food and the occasional record. His Dad helped with tuition and rent, and money was tight for Gary too. So Finn had opted to stay at school, rather than make the trip home this year, and here he was stuck in some kind of holiday nightmare listening to George Michael whine about his broken heart.

He scans the room as he unwinds his tartan scarf from around his neck, eyes sliding over the garland and Christmas bulbs tacked to the felt divider wall that split the normally huge room. Someone must have decided that making the room smaller would make it less depressing for the dozen kids who had to stick around during the holiday. It didn’t help. There are three other people standing in a small group near the wall, making awkward chit chat and clutching drinks in paper cups. There’s two more tables along the divider, one with a punch bowl and a few trays of cookies and assorted other snacks. A squatty guy in a green jumper stands in front of it, holding a red plate and loading it with snacks. The other table holds a small boombox and a stack of CD cases, and Finn breathes a nearly inaudible sigh of relief.

He unbuttons his jacket and walks the few steps over to the pile of coats heaped on a cheap folding chair. He frowns as he zips his discman into his interior pocket and adds his jacket to the pile, he doesn’t like leaving it, but his jeans are narrower than usual and it definitely won’t fit into his back pocket. He can always come back for it if the party sucks too much. He turns to walk away, then remembers his headphones and zips them into his jacket pocket as well. He pats his pants to make sure his flask is still at hand, and then makes his way over to the punch bowl.

The squatty guy turns as he approaches, and Finn sees that his green jumper is decorated with a large penguin in a Santa hat. Finn nods a hello and pours himself a glass of the red juice. Penguin-Jumper negotiates moving his overstuffed plate to his left hand, losing a cracker that promptly gets smashed underfoot, and offers Finn a hand. It’s limp and a bit damp when he takes it, and Finn shakes it for just a single jerk.

“Hey. I’m Peter. So you’re an orphan too, huh?” Penguin-Jumper says with what Finn thinks he’s trying to pass off as a charmingly rueful smile, but looks more like a constipated grimace.

“Finn.” He nods, tasting the sickly sweet punch and thinking longingly of the whiskey in his pocket. Would he get in trouble for pouring himself a drink here in their “dry” campus? Penguin-Jumper just looks like one of those goody two-shoes tattletales who’d scarper off to tell the authorities. He’d have to sneak away to do it.

Finn glances down at Peter’s shoes for a second, staring in fascinated horror at the tassels on his honest-to-God penny-loafers. Peter’s given up waiting for Finn to reply and has returned to the task of demolishing the cheese and cracker platter. He’s talking around his mouth full of crumbs about something, but it’s indistinct and Finn’s not really listening anyway.

‘Do They Know It’s Christmas?’ has started playing, and it’s absolutely more than Finn can bear.

He hates this song. Hates it. His mum had absolutely adored it, and had played it over and over every Christmas for as long as he could remember. The year that she left, he’d heard it on the radio one December afternoon and had a very public and excruciating breakdown in the grocery store. He’d done his very best never to listen to it again after that.

Finn briskly strides the few steps towards the boombox and presses stop on the CD player. The room gets quieter, and a few people turn to give him curious glances, but he just turns his back to them and rifles through the cds that are scattered all over the little table. This is what he’s good at, this is what he’s staying here for bloody Christmas to pursue. Now if he can only find something tolerable in this pile of garbage. He flicks through the Mariah Carey Christmas album, gag, and through a few boy band offerings, which may be even worse. He checks underneath the table for one of the University’s ever present trash cans, because honestly he’d be doing the world a favor to just bin them. But of course, there’s never one when you need it, so he just sets them on the very furthest corner of the table, right on the edge. If someone were to bump the table and they were to fall and shatter into a million pieces, mores the pity, right?

He’s just picked up a CD that might work, when a voice from behind him interrupts his serious musical contemplation.

“Oi! What in the bloody hell do you think you’re doing?”

Finn turns around and is confronted by a tall girl with dark hair scowling at him. She’s got her flannel covered arms crossed over what he can’t help but notice is an impressive rack, and he thinks he can see the familiar Oasis logo emblazoned across her chest. He raises a questioning eyebrow at her, gives a little sneer for emphasis. Who the fuck is this?

“Move away from the stereo, pretty boy. I’ll thank you to let me handle the music.” She says, eyes bulging in a way that reminds him of a toad. An irritated toad. Her mouth is hanging open, and she’s got lush pretty pink lips that are totally ruined by her gaping scowl. Did she just call him pretty boy?

“Excuuuuuse me.” He says in a way that makes his superiority abundantly clear, then rolls his eyes all the way back. “Who are you? What makes you the music police? What would you know about it, anyway?”

“Well, I’m Rae, and I’m the one in charge of the music, ain’t I? And I know plenty.” Her face contorts into another, different expression of disdain. How many sneers does this girl have? She uncrosses her arms and gestures at him with one hand. She’s got her thumb tucked into the hole in the cuff, and he finds this… something. Irritating isn’t exactly right, but it’s somewhere in the vicinity. Also, he was right about the impressive rack thing. They’re huge and pert and the fact that they’re covered in Oasis is a strangely powerful turn on. But she’s awful so he tamps down that line of thought and tilts his head cockily at her.

“Right.” He replies sarcastically, and is pleased with the perfect blend of contempt and authority he’s conveying. He turns to pick up the CD’s he’d placed in the very corner and shakes them somewhere near his head. “That’s why we’re listening to bloody Wham! and Band-Aid and Mariah Carey.”

Her eyebrows lower and two spots of pink warm her cheeks. She’d maybe be kind of pretty if she wasn’t making so many nasty faces, it’s hard to tell.

“Go on then.” She hisses at him, eyes glaring and head cocked challengingly. She crosses her arms again and pops her hip a little bit, and he gets distracted for a second checking out the curve of her hips in the tiny little skirt she’s wearing. It’s barely there. She’s got leggings on, but he’s very capable of envisioning her long legs without them, miles of pale skin in that teensy mini skirt.

What the fuck is wrong with him? She’s horrible, supremely horrible. But maybe some angry sex… He shakes his head, trying to pull himself back to the conversation at hand.

“What?” He asks dumbly, and it’s one more reason to dislike her that he couldn’t manage to keep focused on what he was saying. He’s lost his perfectly cultivated cool guy thing now, and bollocks if he can get it back.

“If you’re so good at knowin’ your music, go on then. Impress me.” Fuck, she’s bossy. But if there’s one thing he’s good at in the whole world, it’s impressing girls with music. He’s intending to make it his career. He’s got this in the bag. So, he smirks at her, raises a shoulder and an eyebrow in an arrogant little smirk that has always gone over well with the girls, and turns back to face the stereo.

He frowns down at the selection for a minute, considers going to retrieve the CD from his discman, but thinks better of it. He shuffles through the cases, searching for the one that had caught his eye earlier, pops out the silver disc and slides it into the player. He quickly skips through until he finds the right track, and adjusts the volume so it’s just a little bit louder than it was before so she can hear it properly. He carefully adjusts his features into another haughty grin before turning around.

We watch the children playing, beside the Christmas tree. The presents are wrapped up, it’s beautiful…

She turns her head away, like she can’t even look at him, and his grin falters minutely at her disgusted expression. It’s a good song, and he knows it. Why this stupid girl’s opinion should matter is beyond him. It’s a fuckin’ top choice, and he feels a bit crestfallen that yet another girl is totally unable to appreciate good music. The Oasis shirt had been so promising.

“Okay, fine.” She rolls her eyes, juts her chin and her mouth gapes open a bit in yet another different sneer. She does this weird little head shake, like she can’t believe what she’s saying, and Finn feels like doing the Rocky dance. He’s the fucking champion, and she’s admitting it. He keeps his carefully composed cool guy face, though. He’s too cool to show his victory over her. “It’s an okay song… the Pumpkins are… okay enough… if you don’t mind mainstream.”

His jaw drops, literally drops. He can’t believe the shit coming out of this girl’s mouth! She’s got some nerve, implying that he’s mainstream. He’s as underground, as off the charts as they come. Him, fuckin’ mainstream!

“What would you play, then?” He’s leaning forward a bit now, like his body can’t contain his disgruntlement with her and he’s got to get closer to shoot it at her. He envisions a wall of gray muck radiating off of him and getting clumped in her hair, and this somehow helps. He forces himself to lean back, regain the high ground, not to let her get to him.

She throws back her head and straightens her shoulders. Finn recognizes this as preparing for battle, and he narrows his eyes at her. She wags her eyebrows at him once, licks her bottom lip quickly. “Bowie, of course. Little Drummer Boy. You can’t do better than Bowie.”

He scoffs loudly at her, rolls his eyes, pulls his head back into his neck. He tosses his head back for emphasis, like her reply is a physical blow, then scoffs again. Fuckin’ Bowie? It’s a great song, classic really, but talk about mainstream.

“Look, Mae…” He starts, ready to tell her just how mainstream her choice is, when she cuts him off.

“It’s Rae.” She’s glaring again, and he’s bizarrely pleased to have ruffled her feathers. Her cheeks are red and her lip is raised in yet another sneer, but this one emphasizes her perfect little cupids bow. It’d be fun to slide the tip of his tongue just there, watch her sneer fade into a sigh. This is an irritating thought, he’s frustrated with himself for being so attracted to her, so he decides to insult her a bit to even things up.

“As in Raymond?” It’s perfect, aloof like he doesn’t care, and just a little bit mean to imply that she’s got a man’s name. As if she’s anything like a man.

“As in Rachel.” She shakes her head at him, rolls her eyes so much that it’s almost as if she can’t help it. Abruptly, she uncrosses her arms and raises her fingers to rub at her forehead before gliding them to press on her temples. “Ugh. Why’d I have to get involved with this bloody party? It’s such a fuckin’ nightmare. As if it wasn’t already bad enough that I couldn’t go home for Christmas, now I have to be stuck here. And the only person here who might be marginally cool turns out to be a total prick! God, I’ve got such a headache. I need a drink.”

He can’t help it, he takes pity on her. He hadn’t really thought about how everyone else here was stuck, too, how he wasn’t the only one who was in a shit situation. Plus, she thinks he might be cool. He’s trying so bloody hard all the time to seem cool, and it’s gratifying to see people appreciate it, even if it is buried under frustration at his dicky behavior. He has been kind of a prick to her. She likes Oasis and Bowie, so she can’t be that bad.

“Here.” He says after heaving a sigh, pulling the flask out of his pocket and pouring a generous splash into his little paper cup. Her body is mostly blocking Penguin-Jumper from seeing the flask, but he caps it and returns it to his pocket hastily just in case. Her eyes are big and dark and unreadable when he thrusts the cup towards her. And pretty. Damn it, she’s so fucking pretty. It’s a problem already.

“Really?” She asks, taking it from him with an incredulous look. He shrugs a little, crosses one arm over his chest to clutch at the other. She just stares at him for a moment, until he nods at her, prompting her to drink.

Rae takes a tentative sip, and hums a little as she tastes it. Then she surprises him by throwing her head back and drinking the whole cup down in two swallows. Finn pulls his head back into his neck again in astonishment, his eyebrows raised as he watches her neck work. Who is this girl? Her eyes are still closed when her head snaps back, and she rolls her neck with a sigh. Her eyelashes, her long lovely eyelashes- fuck’s sake- flutter against her cheek for a moment before she opens her eyes and meets his gaze. She gives him a soft, sidelong kind of smile.

“Thanks.” She says simply, her lips curving mysteriously. “I feel better already.”

She hands him back his little paper cup, and he accepts it without knowing what to do with it. He glances around for a trash can, but of course there isn’t one nearby. Why aren’t there any trash cans in this stupid room? He crosses his arms again, feeling awkward as he clutches the cup. He’s not sure what to say now that he’s decided she’s okay. It was easier being all smug and arrogant and prickish. Now he just feels uncomfortable about being so attracted to her.

“Supper’s ready!” An overly cheerful voice announces, and they both turn towards the sound. He looks over Rae’s shoulder to see one of the history professors in a frilly red apron, wearing oven mitts and holding a pathetically gray looking turkey in a casserole pan. “Everyone find your seats!”

“It’s not assigned seating, is it?” He asks in horror, as the few people in the room begin to mill about the table in the center, examining the place cards at every seat. Rae looks back at him and shrugs, and he thinks she might be smirking at him. “God. Now I need a drink.”

She laughs, the sound is bright and warm and he can’t help but smile when he hears it. She steps towards the table with the punch bowl and gestures towards him beckoningly. He follows her, and looks at her blankly when she holds out a hand towards him. Does she want to hold his hand? He’s not terribly opposed to the idea, but it is a bit weird. Are they just going to stand there near the drinks and hold hands while everyone else eats dinner?

“Your cup?” She asks, cocking her head at him questioningly. He tries to hide his blush with a cough as he hands over the paper cup that he’s crushed slightly. She smiles at him as she smoothes it out and ladles punch into it, but he finds it difficult to meet her eyes. She fills a second cup and then hands him one. “Here, I’ll block you. Christmas Jumper over there looks a bit peaky.”

Finn raises incredulous eyes to her, barks out a laugh as she moves to stand in front of him. He shakes his head and grins at the cups as he retrieves the flask from his pocket and pours a splash into both of them. She’s a kick, this girl. He keeps his head down and looks up at her through his fringe with a little smile, a calculated move that’s been known to go over well with the girls. It seems to work, she grins back with a little side nod and a raised eyebrow.

“Ta. Cheers.” She raises her glass in the air between them, and he moves to bump his paper cup against hers. She holds her cup against her lips for a second and gives him an inscrutable look. There’s a little moment where they just stare at each other, and Finn thinks there might be something to this dumb party after all. But it’s over quickly, and she sips her drink and turns around to start towards the table. He exhales as he watches her move, then shakes himself and walks towards the table himself.

They’re the last two to sit, and Finn winces when he sees that he’s sat between Penguin-Jumper Peter, and one of the girls who’d been across the room and is now openly eyeballing him. He takes his seat with a pained attempt at a smile, and the girl leans over to place a hand on his arm.

“I’m Katie.” She grins, and her eyelashes flutter in an endeavor to entice him. He’s not enticed. He can’t help but notice that her eyelashes are less full than Rae’s, and clearly heavily enhanced with makeup.

He nods at her, gives her a tight, closed lipped smile and doesn’t bother introducing himself. He’s learned the hard way that it’s best to just shut down all conversation with a girl you’re not interested in. Peter, however, seems to have no such scruples as he leans over Finn bodily to offer his hand to Katie.

“I’m Peter.” He says, and gives her a sweaty grin. Finn finds this guy mildly repellent, and it’s clear that Katie’s opinion is little better as she offers him a limp handshake and a half-hearted smile. “And this quiet chap is Finn.”

Peter claps him on the shoulder like they’re old mates, and Finn has to grit his teeth. Who was the brilliant person who decided upon assigned seating? He glances down the table a bit towards Rae, who’s shooting him a cheeky grin, amused at his predicament. Finn wonders for a moment at the fact that five minutes ago, she was berating him for touching the stereo, and now here she is smiling at him like they’re sharing an inside joke, which he supposes Penguin Jumper kind of is. A joke that they’re both silently laughing at. He rolls his eyes for her benefit and shakes his head, shrugging Peter’s hand off of his shoulder. Peter places it on the back of his chair as he leans into Finn to talk to Katie. Finn leans as far back as he can in the confines of his uncomfortable metal chair, trying to give Penguin Jumper as much space as possible.

“So, Katie. What brings you here on this fine winter’s night? Be ye a true orphan, or just an orphan of fate?”

Finn chokes on a snort of laughter, and takes a swig of his punch to try and cover it up. This guy’s an idiot for sure, but he doesn’t like to go around openly laughing in people’s faces if he can help it. As the burn of the whiskey spreads through his chest, he does his best not to grimace. Perhaps he was a little too heavy handed with the flask? Nah, he’s going to need it. He glances at Rae to see if she’s finding her drink too strong, and is disheartened to discover her laughing at some knobhead beside her. Her whole face comes alive when she laughs in the most fascinating way, like some light within her gets switched on to illuminate her in a completely different way than everyone else. This has to be some ridiculous flight of fancy, right? Rae can’t be somehow brighter than anyone else in the room.

He glances at Katie next to him to compare, and has to stifle another laugh. She’s watching Peter speak with something akin to horror, and shooting Finn the occasional pleading glance. He’s tuned out the conversation past the first ridiculous query, but her face is enough to know that it hasn’t gotten much better. Peter is still leaning over him, now with his face propped on the elbow he’s placed on the table next to Finn’s plate. The poor idiot looks utterly besotted, and Finn takes pity on him too. Apparently tonight is the night of Finn Nelson, charitable bastard.

“Do you want to switch seats then, mate?” He asks the question towards the crown of Peter’s skull, which is almost directly beneath his chin. Peter shifts back to look at him with a face that looks like he’s experiencing his own Christmas miracle, and nods emphatically.

“Oh no, that’s not neccess…” Katie tries to interject, but Peter’s already out of his seat and pulling back Finn’s chair for him. The knob.

Finn feels a flash of guilt, he’s definitely ruined poor Katie’s night, but she can’t expect him to eat dinner with Peter angling over his plate, now can she? He doesn’t look at her though, doesn’t want to see the glare that’s inevitably gracing her features. He grabs his cup and moves to Peter’s vacated chair, nods to guy next to him. He glances down the table again at Rae, there are only two people between them now instead of three, but it might as well be a dozen for how funny she seems to find the sod next to her.

This party is such a bloody waste of time. What’s the point? At least at home, he could have felt lonely and miserable without being forced to make chit-chat with a bunch of twats. He should have done whatever it took to make it home for Christmas. He should have never let his Dad talk him in to going to this bullshit party. He should just get up and leave. What’s anybody even going to do? It’s a big school, he’ll probably never even see any of these people again. He shoots the rest of the too-strong punch in his cup and moves to push back his chair, when the kid next to him turns to offer him a bowl of potatoes.

“So, d’ya follow Manchester then?”

—–  
The meal goes by faster than Finn thought it would. Turns out that Andre is a cool guy, and they pass the time discussing football and the sports department at the university. But eventually the topic and the food run out, and he finds himself uncomfortably sober and aware of his own silence. It’s not usually a big deal, he’s not much of a talker, but sometimes his own silence makes him feel stupid. So Finn rises from the table and heads back over to the punch bowl to remedy the sobriety situation.

He’s got his back turned to the room, his punch poured and ready to accommodate the booze when he feels a hand touch his back. He bites his lip against a grin when he sees Rae leaning around him, hand warm against his t-shirt. The dumb through the fringe look totally worked, she’s so into him. He raises his eyebrows instead, plays it deliberately cool.

“God, that guy was boring.” She says, curling her lip up and rolling her eyes briefly. Then she looks at him full on, and her eyes get all big and somehow her eyelashes look longer. Her lips purse a little, but she still gives the impression of smiling alluringly at him. “D’ya think you might share another drink with me?”

Finn cocks his head and runs his tongue along his top teeth. So, maybe it’s less him and more the booze she’s interested in. Still, she’s looking at him in a pretty flirty way so sharing the whiskey seems like a fair trade to see her smile. He shrugs, gives her a little grin and pours the whiskey into a cup for her, then into his own.

“Thanks. You’re a lifesaver. He was seriously awful, I think my ears might be bleeding from all the random shite he was talking. Look, are they bleeding?” She tucks her dark hair behind an ear and leans closer towards him for examination. Her fingers linger against her neck, and he wonders if she’s flirting with him, or if he just really wants her to be flirting with him.

So he moves in, gets his face much closer than it needs to be just to see what’ll happen. He pretends to examine her ear, lets his breath wash over her skin, huffs just a little bit for good measure. When he pulls back, her cheeks are a little bit pinker than they were before, so she probably is flirting. Or at least knows that he is.

“Nah, you’re fine. Are you sure you were bored? You two looked pretty chummy from where I was sitting.” Shit, did that come out jealous? He thinks his tone was pretty moderate, flippant even, but it might have sounded jealous to her. Fuck, he is jealous, so it’s no wonder that he’d sound jealous talking about jealous-y things.

She rolls her eyes. “Uck. No way. It were worse than talking to you, and you’ve hardly been anything other than a right prick all night.”

He squints at her teasing in mock annoyance, but he’s secretly pleased. She’s laughing again, and he thinks he likes her taking the piss, hardly anyone ever gives him a hard time. Keeps him on his toes, he’s got to be quick to keep up with her. “Yes, but I’m the prick with the booze. I think you’re just using me for my whiskey.”

“Maybe I am.” She retorts coyly. Definitely flirting. “I’ve got plenty of whiskey in my room, if you’re so worried about it, pretty boy.”

It takes him a while to process what she’s said. Is she inviting him back to her room? He wants to crow in victory. But then again, maybe she’s just accusing him of being stingy with the alcohol, like she has to replace what she drinks? He doesn’t care about that, she can have the whole bloody flask if she wants, as long as she keeps standing here talking to him. But she did mention her room, so that has to be a good sign, if she’s thinking about him and her room at the same time, right?

Damn, this girl’s confusing.

“I’m not worried, girl. There’s plenty enough here to get you and me both good and sloshed.” He smiles at her, but she’s looking over the room and doesn’t respond. Shit, she doesn’t feel rejected, does she? Cause fuck yes does he want to go to her room, he just wasn’t sure that’s what she was asking. He’s still not sure. But he sure as shit doesn’t want to make her think that he wouldn’t go to her room, wouldn’t be completely chuffed to go to her room, if she was so inclined. Maybe he should say something. But that might just make it worse. And what if she wasn’t asking, what if she wasn’t even flirting? Fuck, what should he do?

“Look…” She says, and it’s drawn out as she slowly turns to face him again. He hopes his face is not betraying his inner angst, hopes it’s back to his practiced cool guy default. “I’m sorry about the music. You were kind of right. There is no excuse for Mariah Carey.”

She winces, and he lets out a weird little snort laugh that he immediately wishes he could suck right back in. He tries to cover it with some teasing of his own. “And Wham! Don’t forget the Wham!”

It feels a bit weird, he’s so used to his asshole persona, so used to being cool and silent and aloof. It’s much harder to josh her around and make her laugh than to stand silently and brood about what an idiot she is. It’s refreshing, really, to not feel mild contempt for a girl he hopes to hook up with.

“Yeah, Wham! is total shite, really.” She smiles as she wrinkles her nose, stupidly adorable. “I’d never play it myself, but my mate Chloe has been helping me with the party and most of her CDs are of the NOW variety, so… she’s been lecturing me about keeping it upbeat.”

Rae rolls her eyes and nods towards the people lingering over the table and chatting nearby, all of whom have taken no notice whatsoever of the tempo of the music. He chuckles as he scans the room. There are only three girls besides Rae, so which one is Chloe? There’s a tall blonde who looks like she’s ready for skiing with a fluffy white fur headband, and a rail thin brunette with overly large glasses.

“Which one’s Chloe?” He’s betting on the brunette, though neither of them look like the type to be friends with a girl like Rae. But then again, she’s messing with his expectations, so who knows.

“The pretty one with the light brown hair and the pink dress.” Rae sounds a tiny bit wistful when she explains, and he studies her face for moment, trying to understand why she’d speak about her friend in such a tone. She clucks under her breath, turns her head sharply towards him and catches him staring. Finn rubs at his ear, follows her finger as she points to… Katie?

“Katie?” He asks, and Rae makes a face at him like he’s crazy.

“No, Chloe. Do you have a hearing problem or something? Or can you just not get girl’s names right?”

He huffs, but he’s embarrassed. He’s never been good with names, and it’s always gotten him into trouble. He’d called a girl the wrong name over breakfast more than once. Bands, album names, even song titles, no problem. But people? No luck whatsoever. He guesses the music is just more real to him than people ever are.

“I get girl’s names right, Rae. At least ones I’m interested in, unlike Katie over there.” There, that was appropriately smooth. And if he had to reveal his cards a little bit, so be it. He is interested in her, she might as well know it. He smirks at her, though he’s secretly a bit anxious as he studies her face for her reaction.

Her eyes are wide and sparkling. It’s stupid, he knows, to be thinking even to himself that her eyes are bloody sparkling, but they are. It’s ridiculous. They’re huge and somehow both bright and dark. He skips his gaze over them, forces himself not to get lost staring into her eyes like some moony idiot. Her cheeks are a lovely pink, and her perfect rosebud mouth is open just a little bit. It looks like an invitation. He’s already told her he likes her, would it be too bold to just kiss those soft lips? Would she like it? Would she even let him?

“Alright, everybody!” Professor Matthews stands, still in his frilly apron, and claps to get their attention. It’s an overly teachery reaction, he thinks, as there are only about ten of them and they all looked up when he talked without the clapping. “We’ve prepared some games, just to liven up the festivities a bit! Who would like to play?”

Though there’s no audible sound, there’s the feeling of a groan in the room. And silence. No one says anything for several long minutes, and Finn has to repress his strong desire to laugh in fear that Matthews would consider that volunteering.

“Oh come now! Surely someone wants to play! It’s scrambled carols!” He steps towards a nearby table, then brandishes a stack of paper in the air. “Rae, how bout you?”

Finn turns his whole body towards Rae in anticipation of her answer. He’s amused that of all the people in the room, Matthews picked her, and also weirdly scared of her reaction. What if she says yes, what if she’s the type of person who likes to participate in school activities? He’s not sure he could get on board with a joiner.

“Sorry, professor. I already know all the answers, remember?” She replies politely, but he notices that she finishes off her drink in one long swallow once the professor’s attention is turned.

“I’ll play, Professor Matthews.” Penguin Jumper speaks up, and he’s even more red faced and sweaty than before. He couldn’t be hitting the booze could he? Then Finn notices Katie/Chloe shaking her head in horror at Peter as he walks towards the teacher. “I’m quite good at riddles. Perhaps we could do partners?”

“Oh, no no. You definitely don’t want to participate in that. You’ll just come help me with the music, yeah?” Rae murmurs, grabbing his hand and pulling him over to the music table. He’s disappointed when she drops his hand in favor of a CD. Then he’s disappointed in himself for caring about holding the hand of some girl he just met. Holding bloody hands. For fuck’s sake.

“Why do you know the answers? And why does the professor know your name?”

“Oh, I’m the RA for Tendham Hall. I get a cut on tuition and free room and board. My mum went to Tunisia for Christmas, so I had to stay for break, but they wouldn’t let me unless I helped host this stupid party.” She shrugs and glances over her shoulder, then reaches to push his head down towards the table. “Look interested in the music, or they’ll make you play.”

“Seriously?” He asks with a stern, faux engrossed face as he nods and studies a CD case. “I didn’t know you could do that! I’ve been killing myself to keep my flat with my internship at the radio station.”

“Well, it’s a right pain in the arse, I’ll tell ya that. Idiots whinin’ at your door all night and day. What radio station are you interning at?”

He looks over his shoulder briefly, and sighs in relief when he discovers everyone engrossed in the game. He is interested in the music, of course, but its better when he can look at her all he wants. There’s only so much interest one can have in Christmas music, and his is about exhausted by Christmas eve. Rae’s still studying the track listing, biting her lip absently. He wants to bite that lip like that. Maybe if he tells her about his jobs at the stations, she’ll be suitably impressed and they can revisit the subject of her room.

“Oh, well, I work at two actually. I’m an intern at Edge, and I have a slot on the campus radio late at night. Wednesday night, midnight to three.” Oh yeah, super impressive dickhead. He should have made it seem like it wasn’t the middle of the week graveyard slot, like it wasn’t the worst possible spot he could have.

“Oh.” Rae’s eyebrows are raised, appraising. She looks… like she actually is impressed by the reality of his shitty radio spot. “That’s cool. I’ve been trying to get on at the campus radio too, but they put you through the fucking ringer first, don’t they? I’m still in the hive sorting vinyl and going on coffee runs for Jerry.”

He snorts, shakes his head as he laughs at the table. He’d sorted albums and fetched coffee for the better part of last year. His girlfriend during the winter had given him such shit for it too, for investing so much time at the station without ever getting any airtime. She’d had such a way of making him feel small.

“I did that last year, too. I only got my spot this fall when somebody graduated. You just have to hang in there. It’s worth it, even if nobody ever even hears my show.” Rae looks up at him as he speaks, and something in her expression makes him feel admirable, feel like he isn’t just faking being the cool guy.

“I’ve heard your show.” She looks down at the table with her admission, and Finn allows himself to grin at the top of her head.

“Yeah?”

“Bit shit really.” She flutters her eyelashes at him, smiles an adorable little half smile as she shrugs.

His laughter is big and genuine and expands within him as it escapes. “Piss off!”

“Well!” She exclaims, and she’s laughing too. Something about her laugh makes him feel bigger, more important. He thinks he might get addicted to the feeling of making her laugh. “You do play an awful lot of crap reggae.”

“Hey! There’s nothing wrong with reggae!”

“Sure there isn’t.” He’s surprised that she’d mock him this way, and even more surprised that he likes it. This is the most fun he’s had in ages. He shoves at her shoulder a bit, and she allows herself to wobble with the movement.

“Any other criticisms, girl?” He asks around the laughter that keeps bubbling out of him. He wonders for a second how long it’s been since he’s felt this ebullient, since he’s laughed this much. It’s been a lonely week since classes ended. It’s been a lonely semester, if he’s honest. Archie’s had a new boyfriend and been mostly out of the picture, and Chop and Izzy have been fighting, so they haven’t been around much either. It’s mostly just been him and whatever casual fling he’s thrown himself into. And the music, of course. No matter what else, there’s always the music. But it might be nice to have someone around to actually share that with.

“Nah. It’s not all bad.” Rae concedes, grinning at him. Her eyes are all sparkly again, and she puts a hand on his arm. He licks his bottom lip and raises an eyebrow. He knows what that move means. “You’re always playing Oasis and the Roses and Pulp, so I guess that balances out the reggae.”

“Always?” He smirks, enjoying her fresh blush. She actually listens to his show. His midweek, midnight show. This stupidly pretty girl with the sparkly eyes and the lush lips and the frankly stupefying rack is probably the only person on the entire campus who actually listens to his show. And she’s funny and dead cool and… he’s in trouble. How is it possible that finding out she listens to his show may have lost him his high ground in this flirtation?

“I may have caught it a couple of times.” She’s a bit haughty, and he can tell she’s trying to play it cool. He’s the master of playing it cool, after all. He bites his bottom lip and smiles at her, reaches to push back her hair, a deliberate move of reassurance and of interest.

“Rae!” Katie/Chloe is suddenly between them, and she shoots Finn a glare as she steps closer to Rae. He makes a mocking snarl at the back of her head, but she’s busy flailing and doesn’t see. “I have to get out of here! That Peter guy won’t leave me alone. Your little friend here practically threw him at me!” She turns to give him a hateful snarl, then whirls back around to Rae. Her hair flicks against his chest. “He’s in the bathroom, so I’m taking off. I’ll call you tomorrow, yeah?”

“Will you be okay getting home?” Rae asks, and Finn cocks his head as he considers her. She’s apparently thoughtful and kind in addition to being funny and gorgeous.

“Yeah, I’ll be fine babes. Merry Christmas! We’ll talk tomorrow.” Finn can’t see Chloe’s face, but he imagines there’s some kind of subtext based on Rae’s eye roll. The girls embrace quickly, and he grits his teeth against the lascivious grin he can feel lurking. There is one situation in which he might be interested in Katie. He rubs his ear and studies the carpet.

“Merry Christmas!” Finn looks back up and finds Rae watching Chloe shrug her jacket on and practically run out the door.

She’s not the only one to notice; people seem to take her departure as indication that the party is over, and there’s an exodus of relieved faces at the coat chair. Andre offers Finn a little wave as he slips out the door with the tall blonde, and Finn nods back at him. Professor Matthews is deep in a conversation with a harangued looking kid near the snack table, and he doesn’t notice the abrupt clearing out until Peter’s exclamation at returning from the restroom to find Chloe escaped.

“Oh, has everyone left?” Peter pouts as he strides around the room, presumably searching for Chloe behind the four pathetic tables and the little Christmas tree.

“Looks like. Pity, too. I had Christmas trivia to play!” Professor Matthews announces, turning towards Peter. The kid he’d been lecturing slips away quickly, grabbing his jacket and leaving the room before the professor has even finished his sentence.

Peter huffs and scowls at the professor and at Rae and Finn. “I don’t suppose any of you have Chloe’s number, do you? We were getting along quite swimmingly. I was only gone a few minutes!”

“Sorry mate. Don’t know her!” Rae’s eyes are big and her voice is high. Finn has to turn away so he doesn’t laugh, she’s so clearly faking. Peter’s never going to buy it. He busies himself stacking CDs.

“Ah well, if it was meant to be, it will be!” Peter’s clearly a drama major. Finn turns around just in time to see him sweep a bow and tip an imaginary hat. “Merry Christmas to you all. May your new year be full of adventure and the call of destiny.”

Finn rolls his eyes as soon as Peter’s head is turned. Penguin Jumper collects his jacket and slowly exits the room with his head hung low between his shoulders. And then there were three.

“Well, it’s still quite early, isn’t it? If we hurry getting this all cleaned up, Rae, I’ll still have time to make it to my sister’s. She’ll be so surprised.” Professor Matthews checks his watch and begins stacking paper plates to go in the trash. If there is a trash.

“Oh, professor, why don’t you go on ahead and let me do that.” Rae offers, and Finn can’t help but smile and shake his head at her. How can she be so nice to the complete knobhead of a professor one minute and taking the piss out of him the next? 

“Oh no.” Professor Matthews scrunches up his face until he looks a bit like a duck, but Finn has the suspicion it’s a put on. “I couldn’t let you do that by yourself! That wouldn’t be right.”

“I’ll stay and help her.” It’s out of his mouth before he’s even completed the thought. Cleaning the room alone with Rae seems like the best possible ending for this ridiculous event. Fucking Orphan’s Christmas.

“See Professor? We’ll be fine.” She moves to stand beside him, and he likes the thought of we, the idea that they’re a unit against the solitary man. She’s smiling so saccharinely, and he’s enamored with how tricky she can be. There’s just no end to the facets of this girl. “You go visit your sister. Have a glass of eggnog for us.”

“Well, if you’re sure…” He’s halfway out the door already, his apron, oven mitts and desiccated turkey collected in a jumble in his arms with his jacket perched on top. “I’ll just be off then. Merry Christmas to you, Rae. And to you… uh, young man!”

They stand together and watch him walk backwards through the door, almost losing his coat as the door swings behind him. Rae sighs as soon as he’s out of sight, muttering thank God under her breath and slumping a bit. Finn leans over to bump his shoulder against hers.

“Just us, then?” He asks stupidly, unsure of how to regain their easy rapport from earlier. He feels so off kilter around this girl, so unsure of himself all the time. It’s kind of horrible, but also kind of refreshing. He so rarely feels like he has to try outside of the station anymore, it’s kind of nice to put a little bit of effort into something else.

“Yeah, thanks for saying that.” Rae turns to face him, tilts her head and offers him a brief smile, then touches his arm again. “He’s a nice man, but a bit of an idiot. I couldn’t stand the thought of making any more chit chat with him tonight. You don’t actually have to stay.”

“I’ll stay.” He calls after her as she walks to the edge of the room and pushes back the felt divider wall, wheeling in a huge trash bin. He tosses back the final swig of punch in his cup, then collects the plates the professor discarded and walks them to the trash can. Rae moves to gather the rest of the disposable dishes and napkins and tosses them. There are a few mostly empty serving bowls on the table, and he scoops the remaining food into the bin and stacks them on the snack table. Together, they pull off the cheap table cloths and crumple them, and Finn squashes them into the trash before folding the tables up and leaning them up against the wall. He’s stacking the chairs with the others when Rae brushes by him with a smile and flicks off the florescent lights.

“That’s so much better.” Finn groans, blinking in the now dimly lit room. “Those overhead lights do my head in.”

“I know, me too.”

He turns to look at her, and is mesmerized for a moment at the way the blinking lights are reflected in her hair- alternately red and blue and green. It’s lovely, like she’s her own kind of Christmas tree. He thinks that maybe he should drape her in tinsel too, then stare in reverential awe at her splendor. He can think of a few things he’d like to tuck under her boughs. He chuckles to himself for a moment, and she turns questioning eyes to him as she stands over the stereo. He shrugs and she shoots him a bemused smile before turning to drop a new disc into the player.

“Bing Crosby?” He asks wonderingly as the familiar strains of White Christmas fill the room. It’s not that weird, he tells himself. Most people listen to Bing Crosby at Christmas, right? Just because he’s been thinking about it, longing for home and for Nan, doesn’t mean it’s some kind of cosmic sign that she put it on.

Rae shrugs a little. “Dunno. I just… like it. It makes me feel more like it’s actually Christmas, y’know? It’s hard this year, being here alone.”

She moves to the snack table and starts piling the remaining crackers onto a plate, and he remembers that he’s actually supposed to be helping. He crosses the room and strips the remaining table, then folds it up with the others. It’s easier to reply when his back is turned anyway, when he can’t examine her face for every hint that he’s giving himself away.

“I know what you mean. It doesn’t feel like Christmas anymore, well it hasn’t really felt like it since my Nan died.” He swallows as he reaches to pull the garland down off the wall, doesn’t glance at her. It’s been years, but it’s still hard to talk about Nan sometimes. “She loved Christmas, would make a big ol’ production of it. She loved Bing Crosby, too. She’d always make me dance with her when It’s Beginning to Look A Lot Like Christmas would come on.”

He chuckles at the memory, feeling twelve years old again and groaning at Nan’s antics. There’d be a fire in the fireplace, and his Dad would be on the floor untangling the wad of lights. Nan’d be lecturing him about how he should have put them away properly, and when would he ever learn. Then the song would come on, and she’d smile beautifully. His eyes mist up a little remembering that smile. Then she’d cluck at Finn, already irritated that he was missing his cue, and he’d roll his eyes and mumble under his breath but go towards her, put a hand on her waist and in her hand. Then they’d spin spiritedly around the room, and she’d laugh and laugh and after about four spins he’d start grinning and laughing too. God, he misses her.

He breathes out heavily when he comes back to himself, then frowns at the wad that he’s made of the garland in his arms. He turns around to glance at Rae as he shakes it out to wind it up properly, and she’s smiling at him with soft eyes. He feels abruptly humiliated, flushed and sweaty. He can’t believe he’d gone all mushy and real like that, it’s one of his rules for the girls he sees, never let them see you actually have feelings. If they know you can be hurt, they’re sure to hurt you. He knows better than to get soft in front of a girl. He knows better, but it’s dim and twinkly in here and there’s Bing Crosby. Fuck. When did he turn into such a bloody romantic? He rubs at the back of his neck and shuffles his boots against the carpet.

“So, uh… You’re here alone? Did your boyfriend go home for the holiday?” He asks, trying to diffuse the weird atmosphere between them. He almost instantly wishes he hadn’t; how desperate does that make him seem? He’s not supposed to care if she’s got a boyfriend. Cool guys don’t care about boyfriends, they only care about getting off and then taking off. It’s been a bit of a policy of his, be cool under all circumstances. He’s failing miserably at this point.

“Nope.” She scoffs, popping the p. “No boyfriend. Just me.”

He glances up at her again, squinting a bit to decipher her expression in the dimness of the room. She’s biting on her bottom lip, avoiding his eyes. She’s got all the dishes stacked and is pulling the tablecloth off one corner at a time, shuffling them from side to side. As he watches her, she raises her eyes to his and glances away quickly when she sees him staring.

“Good.” It comes out without thought, without his conscious decision to even say it. He wants it to have sounded sultry, alluring, but he’s afraid it was actually just relieved and maybe needy. Why can’t he get this right with her? It’s usually so easy, and here he is just mucking it up over and over. You’re not supposed to let them know for sure you want them, it gives them too much power.

But then she’s looking at him full on again, and while she’s not smiling, it feels intense, even intimate. He clears his throat uncomfortably, and she blushes and scurries out behind the folding wall with the stack of dishes. While she’s gone, he closes his eyes and scrubs a hand through his hair. He’s messing it up, and he actually cares that he’s messing it up. What’s going on tonight? He never cares, he’s made a practice of not caring.

But somehow, for some reason, with this girl he cares. He likes her, wants to shag her senseless, sure, but he wants to talk to her too and see her give him that soft look and listen to her laugh at his jokes. He wants to actually take her on a date and he’s weirdly unsure that she’d want to go out with him. He’s got to get it together, pull some of that cockiness back out, flirt more, get in her space. He’s got to get his game on, make her want him.

He’s just finished this little pep talk when she re-emerges from the back room with an empty box. He’s wound the garland and is standing there a bit stupidly without anywhere to put it. Rae crosses the room and offers the box, and he steps closer than necessary to put it in, close enough that her fingers brush up against his chest where she’s holding the front of the box. Her eyes are darting around the room, looking everywhere but at him, so he leans in a little more and puts more pressure on her fingers. She raises startled eyes to him and he meets her gaze steadily, licks his bottom lip and looks at her mouth slowly, deliberately. She swallows, then steps back jerkily and walks over to set the box on the table next to the CD player.

He frowns as he watches her walk away. Does she not want to kiss him? She’s been flirting back, right? Or at least, she was until it was just the two of them left. Since then, she’s barely said anything and she’s made sure to stay on the other side of the room. He swallows and shakes his head, she must not like him. He was kind of a jerk to her. Maybe he should apologize. Or maybe- yes, more booze. Whiskey will help make things clearer. If she likes him, she’ll get friendlier, and if she doesn’t, at least he’ll be number. It’s the uni way, booze makes everything better.

“How about another drink?” Finn asks, striding across the room towards the snack table, looking around for the punch bowl without seeing it. Oh yes, they’re cleaning things up and she’s already put the dishes away. He’s an idiot. He tries to save, pulls out his flask and goes to stand beside her, shaking it a little. “There’s still a bit left.”

She tilts her head and looks at him, considering, and he has a weird sense that she’s making some kind of decision about him. He grins at her crookedly, raises his eyebrows as he unscrews the cap and holds the flask out for her. After a minute, a wide easy grin slides over her features, and he silently exhales in relief. She takes the flask and throws back a long swig, then wipes her lips with the back of her hand before handing it back.

It’s stupid to find that so completely sexy, but there doesn’t seem to be much he can do about it. He shifts his hips a little, restrains himself from adjusting his cock. Her lips are just a little bit damp when she smiles at him and he wants to push her against a wall and kiss her senseless.

He keeps his eyes on her as he puts the flask against his lips and knocks back the remaining whiskey. It’s warm from the heat of his body, but he doesn’t find it as unpleasant as he usually does, probably because her gaze on him feels warm and liquid too, sliding down his throat with a burn just like the liquor. She smiles at him then turns back towards the wall and starts taking the Christmas bulbs down. The little moment is gone, and he finds himself whirling. He can’t read her at all.

He walks down towards the other end of the wall and pulls the bulbs off from that end, taking the garland off as he moves towards her. He hands her the pile of shiny tinsel when they meet, and lets his fingers linger over hers in passing. She turns to put the decorations in the box, then carefully places the CD cases inside it. Finn breaks down the last table and looks around the room.

“Do we take down the tree, too?” He asks, feeling disappointed and anxious. The room is cleaned, the night is over, and he still has no idea if this girl is even remotely interested in him.

“No, that was there before. Somebody else will take it down.” Rae says, and the two of them stand side by side and stare at the tree together in silence for a bit. He wonders if she’s as reluctant to let this evening end as he is. Does she want to stay here with him, or is it just that she doesn’t want to back to an empty room? “I can’t believe how fast we got this all cleaned up. If I was smart, I would have at least hung some mistletoe or something.”

She mumbles it, it comes out in a jumbled rush, but he heard it. She wishes there was mistletoe. For the two of them alone together in this room. Which means she does want him to fucking kiss her! Right? It has to mean that, doesn’t it? He’s still unsure, she’s so vague all the time. She’s a mystery. He wishes he didn’t like it so much.

He turns towards her, stands facing her side patiently until she turns too. “You don’t need mistletoe, Rae. If you want me to kiss you, all you have to do is ask.”

It feels like he’s holding his breath, though air is still passing through his lungs at a measured pace. But there’s that moment, like in the movies, where his breath feels bated and he’s waiting for a response, any response, but hopefully a nod or a smile or something indicating yes. But she stares at him silently, blankly, and his only hint is the pink that’s spread over her cheeks and down her neck.

Finally, finally, she says, “Would you want to kiss me?” And he still doesn’t know what it means. Her eyes are bigger than any eyes he’s ever seen, and the way she’s looking at him makes him feel like he’s the hope of the world. He gets lost in her gaze, trying to decipher what exactly she’s seeing. Doesn’t she see how much he wants her?

He debates for a minute over how to respond. He could make a joke about how no, he just really likes cleaning up after Christmas parties, it wasn’t because he wanted to kiss her at all. Or he could tell her how much more he wants to do than just kiss her, how he wants to rock her world and all that kind of typical bullshit. Or he could just break this tense, full moment and just do it.

But he doesn’t do any of those. Instead he just says, “Yeah.” He makes a deliberate choice to drop all his airs and defenses and let his sincere and honest desire to just know her shine through. He swallows, and this time, his breaths do come with more difficulty as his chest is suddenly much tighter. He doesn’t like it, being vulnerable like this, letting her know, letting her call the shots, but something tells him that this is the thing to do. So he waits for what feels like an interminable length of time.

And then she smiles. As cheesy as it is, he thinks it’s like the sun breaking through after an endless winter. He wants to roll his eyes at his own stupidity, like he’s suddenly some kind of poet, but her smile is so radiant that it makes his chest even tighter, and he’s frozen just looking at her. She’s so beautiful just then, that light he thought he saw within her earlier shining out of her powerfully and illuminating exactly how lovely she is. It’s all he can do to take her in, all he can do to stare in wonder.

“Okay then.” She says, grinning and shrugging. He just continues to stare uncomprehendingly. He feels floaty and spinny and strange, and he hopes it’s the whiskey rather than her smile making him feel that way. She laughs a little, breathily, and he swallows and licks his lips. She takes a slow, deliberate step forward until she’s so close that they’re almost touching. All he’d have to do is lean in just a tiny bit. “Kiss me, Finn.”

There’s just a second where he hesitates, where he scans through his brain to make sure he’s not misreading her yet again. But ‘kiss me’ is pretty clear.

So he leans in that last bit and his lips are on hers, and he has the fleeting thought that “she’s electric” before he loses himself in the sensation of her lips sliding against hers. He takes a step in, though it’s really not necessary, and allows his fingers to finally twine in the smooth strands of her hair. His thumb glides over her cheek, and her skin is so soft that he can barely understand how it’s even possible. Her hand ghosts over his stomach and chest before coming to rest in the crook of his neck, and her touch in that sensitive spot sends tingles shooting along his spine and down through his fingertips and back into her skin.

Her lips are soft and smooth, and he traces his tongue over the fullness of her bottom lip. She makes a little sound and he grins into the kiss, then slips his tongue in to glide over hers. Her other hands comes up to clutch at his shirt over his stomach, and the feeling of her knuckles against his abdomen causes him to press further into the kiss. Her grip on his neck tightens, and he pulls her closer with the arm around her waist. Her hips are tight against his, her fingers sliding up to grip on the ends of his hair, and Finn becomes a little unhinged. He’s fire and liquid and want and raw. His need for her is intolerable, and he wants to press into her, push her up against something, anything.

He pulls back abruptly with his hand still in her hair and breathes shallowly against her lips. Rae makes a little whine, barely audible. He knew he was attracted to her, but he had no idea it was going to be like that. He’s never kissed anyone like that, never felt this kind of pull towards anyone before. She’s like a livewire, and he just wants to do his best to hang on.

“Jesus.” She breathes, and he laughs. “If I had known that was going to happen, I definitely would have brought some mistletoe. We could have been doing that hours ago.”

She loosens her grip on him, slides her hands down along his arms and moves back. The space is welcome, gives him some room to wrap his head around the way his body just reacted. He didn’t even know it could be like that. He’s been with a lot of girls, had a lot of first kisses, but he’s never once experienced a kiss like that. It’s almost scary. Or at least it would be, if he was a bit less muddled by whiskey and want. He wishes his flask was bigger, he could use a bit more of the whiskey about now.

From the boombox beside them, It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas starts to play, and Finn huffs. Rae grins at him, and he rolls his eyes. As if he needs to be more vulnerable in front of this enigmatic girl. They’re still standing so close together, his hand is still resting on her waist, and she sways her hips just a little.

“Dance with me?” She asks, and it’s quiet and sweet, and it makes the ache in his chest flare up again. It’s been hard to listen to this song since she died, and it’s really hard to think about dancing to it again, but something about the twinkling lights reflected in Rae’s eyes and tenderness of her hand against his shoulder makes the hurting a little more tolerable. He takes a deep breath, takes some strength from the kindness in her smile and holds out his hand for hers.

It’s not like dancing with Nan. It’s not really dancing at all, mostly just shifting from side to side and swaying. Rae’s hand is soft within his, and he pulls her closer until his chin is bumping against her hair. She smells like vanilla, and Nan always wore rose perfume. It’s not the same at all, but somehow the swaying in Rae’s vanilla scented arms makes it feel like Christmas for the first time in years.

He swallows against the tightness in his chest, blinks back the tears, and holds Rae closely in silence until the song is over.

“Thank you.” He says gruffly when she pulls back to look at him as the song switches. She smiles at him, looks down at the ground for a second, and he wonders what she’s thinking. He wonders if she’s going to let him see her again, wonders if this is just going to be the first dance of many.

“Hmmm. I think I want another drink.” She says brightly, then moves away quickly to turn off the stereo. She unplugs it quickly and puts it in the box. He frowns after her. Is that it? They’d been sharing kind of an important moment, and then it was just over? Stereo unplugged, boxes packed, see you later pal. Didn’t she feel anything like he was feeling?

“Uh, my flask is empty.” He shrugs helplessly. Why doesn’t he have a bigger flask? Fuck food money, tomorrow he’s going out and buying the biggest flask he can find. This is all over because of his stupid stupid tiny flask.

Rae grins at him mischeviously, striding over to shrug on her coat. “Oh I know,” she pulls on her hat, then stands in front of him and winds his scarf around his neck. “But I do have plenty of whiskey in my room, remember?”

Alright, maybe he’ll keep the flask after all.

She smiles up at him, shakes her head a bit. “Well?” She asks, and it startles him out of his stupor.

“Yeah.” He takes his proffered jacket, shrugs it on, then walks over to grab the box. He can’t believe this is actually turning out this well, that there is actually some good to come of going to Orphan’s Christmas. He feels like he’s smiling too much, as if his grin is too wide and will give him away, but there’s not much he can do about it now. “Let’s definitely go back to your room. Yes.”

Rae laughs, and it fills the air like the ringing of bells. There he goes, getting all stupid and poetic again. But her laugh is lovely, and it makes him feel like there’s hope for Christmases to come, like maybe this is the last year he has to feel like an orphan. She holds out her hand, and he slides his fingers over her palm to twine with hers.

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the MMFD Secret Santa 2014


End file.
